Wow, that title was lame and predictable, was it not? But still, it’s pretty perfect.
Kimono can get very very hot. One of the easiest and prettiest ways to deal with this is simply tucking a pretty and useful fan into your purse, sleeve, or obi. I only have a few, but they’re versatile 🙂
Two-sided dance fan
There is a long and sweet story behind this fan. The city I live in, Montreal, is one of the biggest ports in Canada, and the main entrance into the St. Lawrence seaway. Because of this, we get all kinds of strange boat traffic from all over the world. When I was very young, my parents and I were in the old port area and we came across a gentleman who happened to be a member of the Japanese Navy. His English and French skills were virtually non-existent, and he had gotten himself lost and could not find his way back to the port, or his ship. My father was working in aeronautics at the time and had a few dealings with people from Mitsubishi, and somehow had cobbled together enough to figure out what the poor gentleman was trying to say, so we happily led him back towards the port. His fellow officers were very grateful, and invited us onto the ship for sake (or in my severely underage case, juice).
This fan, along with a banner with the ship’s name, were given to my family as tokens of appreciation for the whole thing.
Stations of The Tokaido – Nihonbashi fan
Yet another item in my strange obsessive collection of Stations of the Tokaido motif items – my only fan, though!
Goldfish fan
Cute summery fan with kingyo (goldfish) motif.
White fan with silver flecks
This was included as a free gift with a couple of obi I bought.
Pink fan with flowers
Given to me as a gift quite a few years ago
Pink bunny fan
Adorable chubby bunnies. I had to have it, clearly.
Bebe Taian
CHOKO Blog
Gion Kobu